By Terry Karkos,Staff Writer

DIXFIELD – Saturday’s benefit supper and dance in Rumford for terminally ill Mary Dodds Beggs, was a big success, said one organizer.

“Everything went great,” Beggs’ sister, Maggie Dodds, said Tuesday afternoon of the event at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Hall on Waldo Street.

“There was a lot of friends and family there, a lot of food and good music. We raised quite a bit of money,” she added.

Family and friends organized the event to raise money for Beggs’ funeral expenses.

Beggs, who was diagnosed with terminal cancer, was told in January that she has less than a year to live.

“I’m only sure of two things in this life – death and taxes – and, thanks to the benefit, I’ve got both of them covered now,” Beggs said early Tuesday evening.

More than 200 adults attended the benefit, she said.

“Everything went marvelous! I got to see a whole bunch of people that I didn’t get to see for a long time,” Beggs added.

Even strangers came out to the benefit.

“They said they had to, after reading the story,” she said of Saturday’s Sun Journal story, which told of her plight and of her losing both her 6-year-old daughter, Bethany, and 64-year-old husband, Frank Beggs, to cancer.

“That story drove people to tears. We even had people come and pay, and then leave. People have also been sending me cards of support, and praying for me,” she said.

With help from her pain medications, Beggs said that she was able to stay for the six-hour benefit, but was “wiped out for a couple of days after.”

“She was real tired,” Dodds said, “but Mary made it through it. She was quite the trouper.”

Mary Beggs also said she hopes to spend time with her 13-year-old daughter, Abby, and will “try to make it to the family reunion in August.

They’re having steak and lobster, I was told.”